Casa de las Americas

Casa de las Americas

My hotel in Havana is hardly two blocks from the Florida Straits, which separate Cuba from Florida. To get to the water's edge, you leave the hotel, walk north along Avenida de los Presidentes for two blocks, cross the Malecón, Havana's seaside esplanade, and you're there.

The first time I took this walk, I had gone one block, and I was in front of a truly remarkable Art Deco building about ten stories high. It looked like a big temple with a steeple or tower, and there was no cross on top. There seemed to be a bookstore on the first floor, but it was closed the first evening I saw the building. A huge replica of North and South America in relief filled a plain space above the main entrance. I learned its name was Casa de las Americas or The house of the Americas.

Havana, like Miami has a fair number of Art Deco buildings, and some in both cities are really good examples, and many of those in Havana are deteriorating. But this beauty shows no neglect, and it's a pleasure to see when you pass by. It intrigued me, so I set out to learn what I could about it. I found out it opened in April 1959, four months after Castro's Cuban Revolution was won. It was one of the first buildings to be finished after Castro came to power, and one of a relative few to be built in the 63 years since. Its purpose was to house a center to promote Cuban and Latin American Culture and literature. This organization was founded by Haydée Santamaría.

Haydée was one of two women in the little band of revolutionries which attacked the Moncado, one of Batista's military buildings in Eastern Cuba in 1956. She survived their one-sided defeat, was captured and sent to a Batista prison where she was tortured. In Cuba there is no status higher than to be one of the original revolutionaries. Haydée was one before Castro went to Mexico, came back in the boat Granma, lodged himself and his platoon in the eastern mountains, and began to take over the country.

After victory one of Haydée's rewards was the Casa de las Americas. There she changed from political warrior to culture warrior. She established an annual prize for literature Called the Casa de las American Prize, and many famous Latin American authors have won that prize.

Havana has bigger, taller, more celebrated buildings, but this one has lodged in my head.
Every time I walk by it, I reflect on its role in promoting culture. Cuba has an old, interesting culture, but it has no humane laws, no municipal humane shelters, and a not-well-developed humane ethic. Perhaps the animals of Cuba deserve a book about them—perhaps one good enough to win the Casa de las Americas Prize.

We'll have to start talking this up.

Les Inglis